Production Diaries:
June 2004
July 2004
August 2004
September 2004
October 2004
Recent Entries:
HUNDREDS GATHER TO PAY TRIBUTE TO THE LATE MAKO IWAMATSU IN CAGES!
Wed, 14 Nov 2007
A SPECIAL TRIBUTE SCREENING OF MAKO!
Tue, 16 Oct 2007
Perles Acquires Cages Distribution!
Wed, 01 Aug 2007
"CAGES" RUNS 4TH WEEK IN THEATRES!
Fri, 13 Apr 2007
IT'S MY TURN TO FLY!
Mon, 09 Apr 2007
"CAGES" SURPRISES MANY AS IT ENTERS THIRD WEEKEND IN THEATRES!
Fri, 06 Apr 2007
"CAGES" ENTERS THIRD WEEK IN THEATRES!
Tue, 03 Apr 2007
LOYAL FOLLOWING TO THANK, AS "CAGES" ENTERS THIRD WEEK IN THEATRES!
Mon, 02 Apr 2007
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What is a Movie?
06/29/04
No matter how much I plan for or imagine how I will approach working with Dickson on this visual journey of acting in a movie, I am humbled by the simple fact that it must be both organically driven and nurtured from the bottom up, and driven especially by gut feeling.
There are no textbooks that I can read, no actors I can consult, and no directors I can confide in. I am truly on my own. Realizing this, I now dedicate several days a week to focus on Dickson until we start shooting. Dickson and I are exploring the entire ramification of this commitment. Explaining and exhausting basic concepts like: What it is to be an actor? What is it like to be in a movie? What is a movie?
Dickson and I are not strangers. I met him more than 3 years ago when I visited the Singapore School for the Visually Handicapped (SSVH) looking for the perfect JONAH. I was immediately drawn to him because of his charm, and also because of his fight to see. Dickson, although legally blind, and considered to have very low vision, tries very hard to utilize what little sight he was born with. Dickson sees only in black and white, and the whites are loud and blinding. It is darker rooms that his vision is better. One thing Dickson has is a good mind. Fine-tuned to details, as in most blind people, his other senses are on high. He is an avid reader, a talented musician, and is social beyond words both at school and in the production office.
Our first few lessons to break open the notion of acting have been to identify some basic elements and discuss them. We talked today about what an actor is, what a character is, what a set is, what a scene is, and what a movie is. We talked about filming the scenes out of sequence and how the different departments work in the art of telling the story. Part of our day was moving around the office from one paper-covered desk to another equally busy-looking desk to meet the Art Department, Wardrobe, Locations and even Casting. It is a lot of information but I can never underestimate his eagerness to understand this new world.
A couple of hours later, back in my office, in lighting that is more comfortable to him, we focused on the basic story line for CAGES. I introduced the other characters in the story – ALI, LIZ, TAN, ETHAN, and LEO. We learned about each and every character’s journey, and how they change during the course of the story. This is critical information, because I know that his primary inspiration in his scenes will rely heavily on his interaction with others. Understanding where the character is in the story, and being able to accept the notion that the character is in a different state of mind every time he interfaces with them will push him to listen to the characters his is facing. He will not be acting, but reacting. We used his Brailler to document our discussion and write vocabulary and basic lines to remind him of the all the characters and their emotional development.
Then we focused on JONAH. Now that he understood who JONAH is in relation to ALI, it was time to give Dickson the details of his character. We wrote down some key words and phrases to describe JONAH.
I broke JONAH down into two categories. The first of two parts was EMOTIONAL. Phrases like: no brothers, no sisters, no father, no friends and no home were powerful and mind bending, but still imaginable. One thing I really wanted to establish today was a clear and concise separation between actor and character. This is why I wanted to spend the time making sure we knew what an actor is, and what a character is.
PHYSICAL was our second category. We established that Jonah had lower vision than Dickson. I decided to give him this challenge to maintain the consistency of his degree of blindness when he becomes too familiar with the sets he’s working in. Knowing his memory, it is easy for him, as Dickson, to have memorized his physical environment in one pass, and this might make his performances inconsistent. Life only happens once, and keeping a sense of an unknown environment would otherwise pose a problem. We reinforced this notion of lower vision for his character by adding that JONAH relied more on touch than Dickson. Again, clear separation between actor and character. We then proceeded to discuss JONAH’s connection with music and finger movements, almost in a nervous idiosyncrasy. That, in combination with a gentle rocking motion in time with an imaginary song that would run through JONAH’s mind, was the first of five physical development stages that we would assign Dickson. I explained that JONAH starts off as an introverted child who blossoms into a healthy and happy child by the end.
Establishing these five stages of physical development will be a quick reference when placing him in a certain scene in the story. I explained that at any time, we may shoot a scene that is early in the story, and then the next minute we may be shooting the ending. Being able to hop around and quickly know what stage of physical development JONAH is in would be a tool he would rely on over and over. It also allowed us to talk more about what is going on in JONAH’s mind. As this is the beginning of our acting exploration to come, we only touched lightly on that subject.
It was a lot to digest for one day, especially one as young as Dickson, but I couldn’t help but think he went home today only to read to his mom, dad, brother, and sister all the things we spoke about today, and shared with them the interesting differences between himself and a character he will be playing out… in a movie that he may never see.
Graham Streeter
Director
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